The Government Accountability Office has found that most federal agencies with critical modernization needs haven’t established plans for updating their legacy systems. GAO said in a report published Tuesday that the 10 most critical agencies with systems that range from eight to 51 years old are using outdated programming languages, deploy unsupported software and hardware and operate with known security vulnerabilities. 

According to the report, three of the agencies in the list don’t have any documented modernization plans while only two established a strategy with “key practices for success”. Agencies identified in the list include the Office of Personnel and Management as well as the departments of Defense and Homeland Security.

“Until the other eight agencies establish complete modernization plans, they will have an increased risk of cost overruns, schedule delays, and project failure,” GAO noted.

The Justice Department is implementing its direct-hire authority as well as a National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education-based approach to establish its cyber workforce and codify related roles, Federal News Network reported Monday.

Greg Hall, chief information security officer and assistant director for information system security at the Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys, said at a DOJ event that the Investment Review Board authorized the hiring of personnel in information system security, governance policy and compliance manager roles. Hall also noted that efforts to retrain and incentivize employees for retention are just as important as recruitment initiatives.

“As these data solutions become more complex, as these IT solutions become more complex, the need for integration is always going to be there. And so it’s important that we develop this knowledge capital,” he said.

The House Appropriations Committee passed a bill to authorize approximately $2 billion in fiscal year 2020 for the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, reflecting a $408 million increase from the president’s budget request, FCW reported Tuesday.

“This 20% funding increase will help the new agency move faster to improve our cyber and infrastructure defense capabilities,” said Rep. Lucille Roybal Allard (D-Calif.), chair of the House Appropriations’ homeland security subpanel.

The bill includes funding increase for several cyber programs at CISA such as the election security initiative, Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation program, Federal Domain Name System egress service and industrial control system cyber efforts. The $63.8 billion budget package for DHS includes $266 million in FY 2020 funds for the Customs and Border Protection, according to the report.

The Customs and Border Protection said a cyber attack on a federal subcontractor compromised photos of travelers and license plates, The Washington Post reported Monday.

CBP said the data breach was discovered on May 31 and did not include travel document images and other identifying information. The compromised images are part of a facial recognition program CBP implements to determine the identity of individuals entering and exiting the country.

The agency said fewer than 100,000 people had their images stolen and none of those pictures had been spotted on the internet or dark web. CBP noted that no agency systems were impacted and that copies of people’s faces and license plate images were moved to the subcontractor’s network, breaching the agency’s privacy and security rules, according to the report.

NASA plans to launch two small satellites for a mission to study the distortions of radio signal transmissions through the ionosphere, a region where particles ionize into plasma this month. The Enhanced Tandem Beacon Experiment or E-TBEx CubeSats will launch on a SpaceX-made Falcon Heavy rocket as part of the Department of Defense’s Space Test Program-2, the space agency said Monday.

The launch would carry 24 satellites in total and take place from Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The E-TBEx satellites will help scientists study the structured bubbles that cause distortions in the ionosphere. These distortions affect communications and global positioning system signals across military and airline operations.

The study seeks to determine how the structured bubbles change over time. SRI International provided E-TBEx’s beacon, and a laboratory within the University of Michigan designed and developed the satellites. The U.S. Air Force recently announced the STP-2 launch’s schedule move to June 24.

The U.S.Army issued a new roadmap outlining plans to modernize its air-and-missile defense through 2028 to deter emerging weapons of adversaries, National Defense Magazine reported Monday. The roadmap focuses on the development of air-and-missile defense technologies, new capabilities for multi-domain operations, training of forces and maintaining forward presence and partnerships. 

“The operational environment has definitely changed and become more complex,” said Lt. Gen. James Dickinson, commanding general of Army Space and Missile Defense Command/Army Forces Strategic Command. Dickinson said the future battlefield may involve advanced weapons like unmanned aerial systems and hypersonic missiles. 

“If we’re going to adapt to great power competition, then we’re going to have to pivot our active air-and-missile defenses away from just rogue states to the real threat,” said Tom Karako, director of missile defense project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

The Army also intends to establish air-and-missile defense battalions that individually have “tailored force packages” to counter specific threats in the future.